Most of the brokers who were asked for their views told MPA that they were in favor of the vaccine, while only one broker openly urged people/staff to get the jab – even though at least two brokers had been directly affected by the virus in some way.

Owner-broker Patrick Stoy, who employs 20 people at his Wilmington-based MC Mortgage Group firm, admitted he had struggled with COVID as the virus had struck almost half of his workforce at some stage. 

He said: “It’s the hardest it’s been right now because you can’t force them (the workforce) to vaccinate. Half our people got vaccinated, and the other half, so far, has not.

“It causes issues, because now that things have opened back up, they travel, go off for a week and then they get COVID. And then they’re out for another 10 days.

“We have struggled tremendously over the last three weeks. We’ve lost a lot of production and our customer service, unfortunately, suffers – and that’s our top priority.”